205 very strange notes. In the only scene that Billy has alone with his father, Bill threatens to send him back to his mother if he doesn't behave, and there is such ugly menace in his tone that I had the vagrant thought that Chelsea was making another big mistake in her life-that Bill, the bearded dentist who talks L.A. psychodrivel, was some sort of weirdo con man There certainl y seems to be something suspi- cious about him when he has a conver- sation with Norman and his face switches expressions crazy-fast-he's like a speed freak trying on attitudes. It turns out that Bill IS meant to be a charming fellow and the right hus- band for Chelsea-it's only Mark Rydell who has taken leave of his senses. In extenuation of Dabney Coleman's performance, it should be pointed out that Norman mocks Bill so cruelly and so sneakily that it might be difficult for any actor to know how to read Bill's lines. As the playwright has set things up, Norman, who has the bulk of the one- liners, gets laughs by jokes about his own enfeeblement and then gets more laughs by being on top of the situa- tions and zapping people who think he's feeble. We're meant to enjoy the way he picks on people and makes 1 . them feel foolish, and we're also asked $ to weep (and people around me cer- . tainly were weeping) for his frailty, for his courage, for the beauty of his love affair with his wife of forty-eight years. The author is both ruthless and shameless-a real winning combina- tion. He even gives Norman a bit of an angina attack onstage ( sorry about that -on camera). The fakery at the core of the material is that Norman is a mean old son of a bitch to his daughter and to just about everyone else except his wife and Billy . Yet we're asked to dote on him, and Chelsea is made out to be a neurotic mess for not having responded to his true loving nature. Chelsea is a terrible role, and Jane Fonda plays it so tensely that she's like an actress in a soap opera telegraphing her psychiatric miseries. (In a lakeside scene, in a bikini, she looks spectacu- lar, yet she keeps her body held in so tIght that you can't believe she's breathing.) Ethel, who is so under- standing with her husband, is starchy and impatient with her daughter, tell- ing her, "All you can do is be dis- agreeable about the past. What's the The entire range of Hopper's work, beautifully "Compellingly readable. · · a probmg and vigorous illustrated WIth over 500 plates, 280 in full color. portrait of the Hunt dynasty" - Washington Star. point? . . . Life marches by, Chelsea. I $35.00 mUSe $16 95 suggest you get on with it." That's . AT ALL BOOKSTORES :s h:e ; k po; o h:; ;: d T . .ë : .i :: . : . . i .. ....... . -_.. .. Q v -- - 'è\. ç:::J ,,, " t-S' _" , .. ()" ' 'l ", "' '- ;! .:1ì. .... " À "An essentIal work.. . for any concerned WIth the "A rare book-at once of great unportance and actions and passions of our time. "-Library Jour- wonderful to read." -Saturday Revzew. Illus. nal. muse $9.95 $14 95 " " "',, . '- "ti t þ , -- 'I: < ' "- 1, , '> .. \ .",..... , fir, "" ......... I .<fIII'I' ->{ ... "'>- ,.. "\. ,..,-;. ............. .!r.o . -:. 'b. \. . '\"'I'" ""' . >It,. - ,. "ò\?J:f:\ - . r>'" --t- t The autobiography of the man who wrote a new II A dark picture, drawn with intelligence and with chapter in the history of neurosurgery Dlus. neither stridency nor malice." -New R eþublic. $15.95 muse $18 95 \ ..#.' !{:; :.. .... - , ...... "Biography at its best." -N.1': Ttmes Book Review. "A masterly work." - Ttme magazine. Illus. $19.95 \ \..")vv -à "\) "'i.. VS '5 .;.' VS 'l ._._ .__....... The ins and outs of attracting and feeding birds at home-and a tour of major field events. Illus. $15.95 >, I.'. , :. "\ .,." .-I/IIil i/Jb 11< .. H ..,.. v.<. d .". < 'C _" 1;P < d' % -- , -. M:"Ø ' :4 \ \ > :n'> : '\ :, ,.,. II: '\ ' ,, .,:, ,-.-.; ..,. ,.;.